Internet Archive - downloading without breaking the law!

The Internet Archive site is a fascinating project with a number of strands. There's plenty for me to be absorbed by here. The archive has freely accessible material in a number of areas. There are films, live concerts and poetry recitals. There are 10,000 shows stored in the live concert archive. I have to admit to not having heard of most of the bands featured, but there are over 2,700 Grateful Dead concerts if that is your thing.

There's material from Allen Ginsberg in the Naropa Audio Archives. There's so much to look at and download here and it is all legal, since this is a project initiated by and including the US Library of Congress and the Smithsonian as collaborators.

Workshop on Archetypes

Over the last ten days I have had the chance to deliver a workshop testing out some of the ideas from my PhD thesis. The workshop, called "Working with Archetypes: understanding individual and group behaviour" takes a group through a series of exercises and techniques which introduces the concepts and ways to make use of archetypes in a practical way. The focus of the workshops was the work setting, as they were delivered on a programme through Manchester University. There is, though, enormous scope for further developing the ideas within the workshops to work with a wide range of groups. The key theme of the work is personal development which lends itself to many settings.

National Novel Writing Month

National Novel Writing Month

This looks really good. National Novel Writing Month - or NaNoWriMo for short. It starts on 1st November and participants have until the end of November to write a novel of at least 50,000 words. The full description is on the site - it's about setting the standards low to make sure you reach that goal of writing a novel. A great idea to overcome that perfectionist streak in us all which stops us from getting into certain projects, and from completing other ones. I'm thinking about it - might just take part! It's a couple of thousand words a day!

Party Music - On Being a DJ

We are having a party this weekend, to celebrate me completing my PhD. It took seven years part-time and the end of it feels like a great excuse for a party.

I have spent the last 24 hours using every available minute to pull together the party music - I'm trying to put together a mix of mainstream with the occasional unusual track which is accessible to the wine drinking party go-er who is busy talking to someone as the music plays in the background. I have even slipped in a couple of tracks from the Okna Tsaham Zam CD. I have put together about 6 hours of music - could easily have come up with double that!

Doing this process is a way of exercising the long term ambition I have to be able to do a radio show, perhaps once a month. I would love to spend an hour or two each month sharing music which I think is wonderful with anyone who want to listen. If anyone out there knows where I can do this - on the net, or on the air - email me or leave a comment below...

You only get to live your dreams if you ask the question and put the request out there.

Margaret Wheatley & New Science

Margaret J Wheatley

I'm reading "Leadership and the New Science" by Margaret Wheatley at the moment. It's a fascinating read, taking in the breadth of new sciences from quantum physics to chaos theory. I like the way she begins and ends each chapter with a vivid image, and piece of descriptive writing.

I've given a web-link to her website where she has posted a whole stack of articles which she has written. I'm going to browse through these over the coming weeks. Worth a look, I think.

BlueWater Books - details of first two booklets

I have just worked out how to get images into my blog. So, I am posting details of the first two booklets that I published last year, together with images from the covers. If you are interested in seeing these booklets drop me an email (email address here). I've also put these details on a new blog which will cover details of launch dates for new booklets, extracts etc. (bluewaterbooks)

Booklets published August 2003:

'zen words' (bw001) 52 pages

a collection of poems which explore language, landscape and the self, each poem captures the indefinable and attempts to distil it in words. These poems create vivid moments, with their use of language.


'umbrian images' (bw002) 36 pages

a sequence of poems reflecting on a holiday in Italy, which captures both the sense of location and the wonder of the Italian language. The poems included in this collection also capture Assisi just weeks before an earthquake destroyed frescoes and buildings.

shaman voices

Last night I spent the evening at our local Borders store, browsing and reading and drinking coffee. Oh, and way too much cheesecake.

I bought the most amazing CD. It's an album by Okna Tsahan Zam. He plays the dombra, which is beautiful to hear, but it is his voice which is breath-taking. I know that's a corny expression - but this literally does stop you in your tracks. He is Kalmyk, a Mongolian. He sings using overtone chanting, called hoomii. The CD came with a bonus DVD on which you can see him doing this chanting. He can produce two notes at the same time, which then resonate together. It has to be seen and heard to be believed. The music on the album is stirring, soul reaching music. It is interspersed with fragments of sounds of the landscape. The whole album is something that you really should hear.

transcending

it happened quickly
when the first shards of light at early morning
had glanced over the hills.

then was the moment when
I fully realised that all this searching
collecting of myths, looking beyond beauty and nature

would leave me now, emptiness
glances across a crowded room
people we once respected, open to criticism.

inside my own mind, of course,
I knew all too well that the special moments
of a life long-lived, now loved, would come in time.

blue as a colour that I shared so often
and yellow as a sign of morning’s hope
whilst standing alone, looking into the waves ahead

and just wanting it all to stop
for a few seconds of silence
where the river meets the sea, your thoughts and me

no longer as lucid as a sheltering sky
making no sense and wondering why
light opening outwards, learning to fly.

- from 'the alice conversations'. Work in progress.

John Cage

Books arrived from Peter Riley this morning. They included a copy of 'M: writings 67-72' by John Cage. I'm really excited about getting this book. I've been trying to get hold of some written material by Cage for a while now (maybe 2 years!) and have had no success until now. I'm particularly keen to see his book 'Silence'. Anyway, the book I received this morning loooks brilliant - lots of typographic tricks, visual uses of language and diary extracts. I'm really looking forward to working through it.

I also got Rupert Loydell's 'The Museum of Light'. I'll put comments about this here when I have had time to look at it. Two more books were - William Oxley's 'Collected Longer Poems' and 'Poetry with an Edge' edited by Neil Astley. I'm looking forward to a few train journeys in the future when I can work through these.

Music in the background - 'Tremble Peady' by People Like Us (Vicky Bennett), brilliant and weird...

Mike Snider's Formal Blog and Sonnetarium

Mike Snider's Formal Blog and Sonnetarium

Mike Snider has been looking at my weblog, and has put a link to it on his site. Well, thanks very much for that! Mike's various sites are well worth a visit. There's a link to his weblog over in my 'Weblogs I Watch' column to the right. Or you can follow the link in this entry.

e e cummings

Last night I did some more work on the booklet 'edge of water'. Then I sat around for half an hour, listening to the 'panthalassa' remix album, whilst reading poetry.

I browsed through 'The Book of Demons & Pearl' by Barry MacSweeney. This is powerful, ranting poetry with vivid use of imagery. One to spend some more time on. Then I dipped into a book I have by e e cummings called '95 poems'. I haven't sat and read his work for years, and I was quickly reminded of the moments of epiphany that arrive as you decipher his poetry. My favourite from last night is set out below. Tip: look for the word wrapped around the bracket first. It's a beautifully poignant piece of work with so little material achieving so much.

l(a
le
af
fa
ll
s)
one
l
iness


(1958)

And there's a link on the web, where you can read 153 of his poems (don't you just love the internet!) It is here.

Deranged but still writing

I'm filling my head with the deranged sounds of The Residents and People Like Us, both of which are so incredibly diverse and innovative, whilst still keeping a strongly specific sound, so that you know that is who you are listening to. I think I have written about both of them in earlier entries to this blog. The whole of the People Like Us back catalogue is available for free download here.

There is a statement on the website:

"Many thanks to the brilliant Ubuweb for hosting the tracks below to make it more accessible for more people to download for free. We strongly believe in the power of profit through free distribution, and the publicity that comes along with that - so we are putting our money where our mouse is. Often people have never heard of an artist because they aren't being distributed through as many channels as they should be, due to the very poor state of music/media distribution for non-major label music coupled with ignorance of the way that avant garde art forms infiltrate mainstream culture."

All of this music is helping creativity to move again. Last night I spent a couple of hours preparing my third book of poems for publication by bluewater books. It is called 'edge of water'. See an extract from it here.

I've also been writing new material for the next collection, 'the alice conversations', due out soon. I wrote something last night, which veered off into recollections of summer holidays as a child in Margate, Kent, England. Strange that it should come into my mind, but there's a useful vein to mine there.

I'm having artist days - to focus the musical background as I work away at the computer. Today was Robert Wyatt day, spent listening to the 7 albums I have by him. This was prompted by being hugely impressed by listening to the Soft Machine double album 'Peel Sessions' yesterday. I've had this for a while now, and his taken until now to grow on me. Upcoming artist days include King Crimson, David Sylvian (guess that'll last a few days as I have so many albums by him!)

And here's a crazy idea for digesting. I've always dreamed of being a DJ. So, why keep it as a dream. I'm going to do what I can over the next couple of months to see whether I can find some means of getting on the air even if it is only for an hour a month. Signing off now, turning dreams into reality.

Grumpiness and Miles Davis extractions

I've just come through a grumpy weekend. Things are bugging me!

On the plus side, I bought an album of remixes yesterday which is brilliant. I've been listening to loads of music by Miles Davis over recent days - Bitches Brew, In a Silent Way - both of them in the Complete Sessions format which represents a staggering array of music in a highly prolific period.

Well yesterday I bought the panthalassa remixes. I've already got the original (?) album put together by Bill Laswell. This is a collection of remixes by half a dozen DJs including Laswell himself. I love the idea of working with original material and generating something new. It always gets me thinking about parallel ideas in the world of poetry. Variations and versions. I've done some of this with 'Blue's Song of the Earth' and 'Zen Poems'. With the first collection I worked with found texts, and with the latter I re-worked poems into new variations as the collection developed. I'm going to do some more experimenting later this week, using the panthalassa album and its remix version as source material to generate some poetry. This should be great fun!

Light Sparkle and Thread of Colours

Just for a change today, I thought I would post a poem I wrote last week. It is part of the sequence that I am working on at the moment called 'the alice conversations'. Comments welcomed.


Light Sparkle and Thread of Colours

Alice is standing – waiting – wondering – without pause
Now she looks at me, and she sees through
Sees the energy flow within, up and down my spinal column
She understands and feels this flow,
Drawing it up from the ground, pulling it down through my crown


She watches as the energies mingle,
Light sparkling of orange, red,
Green, purple, and white, white, white.
All colours flooding through my mind,
Swirling and swaggering
Awakening me, bringing greater intuition.


Then she sees through the fog of greyness,
And with fingers of an adept
She threads colours through the mist, weaves them together
Creates a river, many coloured and flowing with warmth.


Now I am sitting on a chair.
No, more like a throne.
My arms resting on the arms of the throne,
I seem to be moving through the air, neither up nor down
Feeling intense heat,
Flushing through my body, pushing out all
Negative thoughts, cleansing
My energy system.


And I am at the feet of thousands of others,
All smiling, seeing me
And not seeing me.
Being a part of a great mass,
Not alone, not individual,
Merged with the entirety that is all, that is one



Male and female, spirit and soul. The conversation
Means much when words are no longer used,
When synergy comes through, when qualities merge.
The edge of understanding is a step into air,
Hands over the eyes,
Helping to channel the seeing in the mind’s eye.


There is air, there is no movement.
There is fire, there is no burning.
There is water, no drowning.
There is earth, no burial.


Through elements comes balance, and through
Balance comes the energy to move forwards,
Break the wheel, pass onwards.

British Poets Discussion List

News today from the British Poets discussion list (info can be found here). This list has been managed by Trevor Joyce and Cris Creek for a while now - they did a great job. And they are both excellent poets too! As of today the management of the list has moved to Mairead Byrne and Rupert Mallin. I know of Mairead Byrne - I read her weblog regularly. I enjoy the poetry that she posts there. I have not heard of Rupert, but his post to the list inviting people to send new things in was very encouraging. I'm going to send something within the next couple of days.

I also received the latest lists from Peter Riley's poetry books by mail service. There's some interesting items on the list - I think I feel an order coming soon.